Pages

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Tuesday Tropes: The Collapsing Lair

After all they've been through, our heroes have defeated the baddie. Time to celebrate, right? Unfortunately, the villain's pad hasn't been renovated in centuries, and for some odd reason, killing off the bad guy resonates throughout the entire structure. No time to party. They have to run for it, before the ceiling crashes on their heads!

The Collapsing Lair - The demise of a villain's base of operations after their defeat, an event that results after accomplishing a goal in a structurally unsound place (usually an ancient tomb or treasure room). Often used as a grand finale or as an easy way to obliterate any remaining minions or evidence of the villain's existence.

On rare occasions, the villain may be alive while the place falls down, and ends up "going down with the ship," so to speak. Having a herd of unicorns trampling by your front door is certainly of no help.

I hope Haggard's insurance covers unicorn stampedes.

At other times, a Collapsing Lair may be caused by a booby trap or a switch, meant to activate a snare that will bury any who trespasses.

Run, Indy, run!

Now hold on a second - how come all these ancient structures get to have all the fun? Why not shake things up a little by having the lair be a starship, collapsing in a great ball of fiery glory or something?

Oh, right ... they've done that ...

This is a fun trope to apply if there is a sound reason for it, otherwise it looks and reads tacky when it's thrown in without foreshadowing it, or it's there for no other reason than to pour salt into the wound.

And thanks for visiting my laire; mind your heads on the way out ...

What are your favorite Collapsing Lair scenes? Which ones made you groan? Have you ever thought of using this trope, or have you?

*Note to self* Foreshadow the collapse of my villain's lair. Possibilities include mentioning the faulty plumbing of his dark and evil castle or maybe the fact that inept trolls were paid under the table to do the electrical work. Or maybe just sprinkle in bits about the random boxes of dynamite left in the castle dungeon.

(heh...okay. I should probably get back to the housework. But great post. I've never thought about The Collapsing Lair Trope. Oh, and I'm reading The Lost Hero right now, too. It has one of the best first lines, right?)

This is a trope I seriously don't get. Now I understand if the Hero knocks it down in some epic battle, but the anti-hero self-destruct switch NEVER works. The bumbling evil side kick will be the one to accidentally find it :)

Ripley destroyed the Nostromo in ALIEN right? Also, James Bond did it. A lot. If we move to TV, it happened in both BUFFY and ANGEL; the former when Sunnydale crumbled away in the finale, and the latter when the Wolfram & Hart building in the ANGEL finale. Of course, it happened other times throughout both series. Going further, there's always HALO. And it happens several times throughout the FALLOUT game series.

Ever notice how the villain's lair toppling is the signal for the end, but if the hero's pad gets tossed, it always leads to the big rally?

The Bat Cave has been blown up, Hogwarts was beat to hell, and how long do you think it took them to repair Minas Tirith? (Must have cost an arm and a leg too, what with no more cheep Orc labor to he had...)

Also, I don't know the best, but I can tell you the most irritating: Legend of Zelda. Here you get to the end, kill the bad guy, and you think you are done... then all of a sudden the lair starts to fall, and you have to get out before it crushes you, adding a whole another level to a game you thought you'd finally beaten!

Kinda lame actually. After emerging victorious from an epic battle in which you ensure the survival of good over evil and save countless lives, getting taken out by a falling rock is a pretty piss-poor way to go.

You've got to love the end of Star Wars and the Death Star destruction.I haven't written any lairs so far, but there is one in my planned sequel. Now I come to think about it, it would probably ramp up the tension as the try to get out in the nick of time :o)You didn't mention whether you've used this yourself.Thanks for the inspiration :o)

Collapsing the lair is just. so. handy. Especially when there's all those annoying minions to deal with. Plus, doesn't it look way cooler to run out after you've beat the baddie than to just casually walk out, blinking when you get back in the sunlight?

Yup, I definitely use this one! The Mummy example is one of my favorites. So is the scene of Cutler Beckett's death in the third Pirates movie, where he's walking in a daze down the stairs as the ship explodes around him.

YA Paranormal Fantasy

Welcome to The Cosmic Laire, the official site of fantasy and science fiction author, David Powers King. David's works include WOVEN, THE UNDEAD ROAD, and FULL DARK: AN ANTHOLOGY. He currently resides in the Mountain West with his wife and 4 children. Click About to learn more.